popping the question
by Clorinda
Summary: Who knew it would be THIS hard to ask a girl a simple question? Throw in Nami Amou, a rock concert, and Len's inexperience with girls, and you have … a royal disaster. Tsukimori x Hino


**Author's Note**: I'm sure you already know this, but just in case: in Japan, friends mostly refer to one another by their family names; no honorific or just a first name indicates a surprising degree of closeness, especially between boys and girls. This is for** Isha Libran** ... happy birthday, 2009!!!!

* * *

**popping the question**

**By **Clorinda

Who knew it would be THIS hard to ask a girl a simple question? Throw in Nami Amou, a rock concert, and Len's inexperience with girls, and you have … a royal disaster. [Tsukimori x Hino]

* * *

Len Tsukimori stared at his sempai (not that he regarded _Kazuki Hihara_ with such respect), utterly baffled. The latter might as well have been holding out a pair of lizard's tails to him.

"C'mon," he prompted, mistaking Len's confusion for shyness. "Take 'em."

"But it's _two_ tickets," pointed out Len. "You're giving me one extra."

Hihara rolled his eyes, good-naturedly. "That's the whole point of these things, you get to take a friend along."

Len wished like never before that he hadn't been passing by the local park at precisely eleven-fifteen, in time to watch Hihara in a heated battle on the basketball court, with a group of older boys that he didn't recognise. (Hating himself for wishing he could join them, not that his parents would ever hear of it.)

He wished even more that he hadn't distracted Hihara by inadvertently catching his eye, making him take a break from the game and come over to the chain-link fence to talk to Len. He had been enjoying the game more than his sempai's (admittedly attractive) face.

Somehow the entire incident had wound up with Kazuki offering him a pair of tickets.

"_Two_ tickets to the Gackt concert?" repeated Len in contained horror, mistrustfully staring at his sempai's offering. "I have no one to go with."

"You sound like Cinderella," remarked Kazuki with a hint of a smirk that he could only have picked up from Yunoki. "I'm sure you'll find … somebody."

The mental image of Ryotaro Tsuchiura popped up like an ugly Jack-in-the-box in Len's mind. He grabbed the tickets; _there was no way he would let Tsuchiura beat him to this one_.

"Are you asking me out, Tsukimori?" asked Nami Amou flirtatiously, her voice breaking up with static over the line. "Hold on, I'm passing through a tunnel…"

The line went dead.

Sitting on a park bench in formals and the noonday heat, Len glared at his phone. Amou was the only girl he knew who didn't like classical music exclusively, and then _this_ was what happened?

Within minutes, she called him back. "Sorry," she said breezily. "Yep … where were we? A date?"

"It's just one evening," he corrected.

"Yeesh, Tsukimori, I was _kidding_. Are you _always_ this up_tight_?" She breathed the last word, laced with innuendo, and the blush shot up his face, right to the roots of his hair.

"Bye, Amou, talk to you later," he managed out, nearly choking, and hung up.

He stared blankly at his hands for a few seconds, with a nagging sensation that he was missing something; then the realisation hit him. _I am a … cretin_.

Looking around to double-check that the park was empty, Len smacked himself upside on the head.

Unable to make himself _call_ Amou again, he texted her instead: _Can you send me Hino's number?_

She messaged him back with it, adding a smiley face. It was _smirking_.

"Hello? This is Kahoko Hino, can I help you?"

Len tried to speak, but his tongue felt like fungus had grown all over it from non-use.

"Hello?" she repeated patiently. He had to marvel at that; _he_ normally unleashed his icy rage on such callers who just hung on the line and said nothing.

"H-Hino?"

_W-why are you stuttering_? mocked his Inner Voice mercilessly. "Hino?" he repeated in a stronger voice.

A strangled sound on the other line. "_Tsukimori-kun_?" she squeaked.

_Oho!_ went his Inner Voice. _A nervous idiot to rival even you_. _You two are made for each other_.

This is stupid, decided Len firmly, telling his Inner Voice to shut up, and screwing his courage to the sticking place … which had somehow gone … a bit rusty?

"I need to ask you something, Hino," he said formally, hoping she'd follow his example, and this wretched business would clean itself up. "Do you — do you like Malice Mizer?"

He pronounced the bandname like he was being made to say _dominatrix_ aloud at one of his mother's networking evening parties. He even had to cross-check the name written on his palm to ensure he got it right. (Thank god for the Internet and instant web access on your phone.)

She seemed taken aback. "Uh — uhm — do_ you_?"

_Uh-oh, trick question_. "Yes, he said, trying to sound off-hand and casual about it, hoping she'd buy it.

"Oh?"

_Dammit!_ Why did she sound so sceptical? Was Jrock so incongruous with his taste in music in general? Mentally, he reviewed his position, and winced. Hell, he was sitting in a park on a Saturday morning, in formals. At _noon_.

Thankfully, Hino wasn't the kind of girl who brought these things up in polite conversation.

"Well, I've got two tickets to the Gackt concert," he told her. "Tomorrow night's," he added, even though this wasn't the kind of thing one forgot easily.

"Really? That's great." She didn't seem too enthused at that.

"I got them from Hihara … sempai, who got them from Yunoki-sempai…" _Why am I babbling like an incontinent fool_? "And I was … wondering … maybe…"

"Yes?" Her voice came out tinny, ever-so-slightly hopeful.

"See, I've got _two_ tickets…"

"And—?"

"Hihara-sempai all but _insisted_ that I should take someone…"

"So—?"

"You … I thought…"

"I would love to go with you," she finished for him, finally taking pity.

He was about to thank her (bubbling with relief,) when it occurred to him that something wasn't quite right, that there was something funny about her voice. Heart thudding so hard in his chest that it almost hurt to breathe, he stood up on shaky knees and cautiously turned around.

Kahoko Hino was standing not three feet away from him, phone pressed to her ear, one hand raised in a wave. She was smiling.

Sliding his phone closed, Len thrust it into his pocket. It gave him something to do with his hands, prevented her from seeing how much they were shaking, as she came closer until only the back of the bench separated the two of them. It was the closest they had ever been physically, with him not minding her proximity, and rejoicing in the rush-thrill in his blood at being near her.

"So," she began, smile widening into an amused grin, "I didn't know you liked Gackt."

He looked into her coffee-coloured eyes, and all ability to lie treacherously left him. He shrugged.

"I don't like him too much, either," she told him conspiratorially, leaning closer. "Too emo for me. Do you want to go out for a coffee, instead?"

For someone who prided himself on his poker face, Len couldn't stop his eyes from fractionally widening in surprise. Hino was smiling at him from under lowered lashes, shy and knowing at the same time.

"I'd like that … Kahoko."

"Me too … I'd like that a lot, Len."

—- **finis** -—


End file.
